Year Of No Light - Ausserwelt: one of 2010's little treasures you might have missed.

These French post-metal dudes spent an awful lot of time making their sophomore release, the follow-up to 2006's Nord - another album you might want to add to your Do-Want!-list while you're at it. But all the hard work during their long absence really pays off (ya hear that Korpiklaani?) as Ausserwelt is a clear step-up from their already superb debut record.

Another essential bit of info you'll need. The band went from a quintet to a quartet after the vocalist's departure, back to a sextet after enlisting a new drummer and a new guitarist (who also plays in the French doom band Monarch - another band you might want to add to your Must-Listen!-list while you're at it). In case you're not keeping score, Year Of No Light is now an instrumental outfit with three guitarists and two drummers.

And thus ends the paved road for this review. What follows is only an attempt to describe the sweet indescribableness that is Year Of No Light. Cheat tip: the album is awesome.

Above all, this album presents itself as a dark, dense and heavy record - and exactly how a year with no light would sound like (yes, I'm cheap). What you get here is the formation of one massive black hole that is blending together metalgaze, droning noises and even doomy passages, interwoven with layers and layers of swelling melodies, slowly sucking the listener right in. One of the absolute strengths of this band is creating somber and surprisingly hostile soundscapes without ever getting dreamy or boring.

...Only to leave your ears smoldering in your headphones, craving for yet another listen that'll probably sound different than the previous one. Recommended!

Post-metal, really? I assumed depressive black based on the band name...

Interesting review, and the atmospheric side sounds harsh enough for my tastes. It isn't at (or near) the top of my list of things to check out, but I'll probably get around to this by the end of the year.

Good album, and I pretty much agree with your review. I'm not sure if it's my favorite post-shit release of last year or not, but it's pretty close. Rosetta is a little more accessible, Her Name Is Calla is more intricate. Here's what I wrote for the MS Awards nomination (I guess "atmospheric sludge" would be a better description, but since everybody's talking about post-metal...):

A follow-up to the crushing sludge of the deubt Nord, Ausserwelt is a leap forward for Year Of No Light. They four-track album eschews all vocals in favor of going instrumental. Ausserwelt is massive and dark, borrowing more from post-rock than sludge by now. It is a melodic but slow and heavy piece of music that will probably appeal to fans of doom metal, post-metal and post-rock alike. Ausserwelt stands out in the post-metal trend by virtue of its tasteful instrumental approach and its seamless integration of various influences. On the other hand, it is distinct from generic post-rock due to its heaviness and steering clear of the "quiet-LOUD-quiet-LOUD" format - it mostly just stays LOUD.

Saw them perform this album live last April/May and damn skippy, yhat was some of the most intense live shit I have ever experienced. the three guitars and two drums assault works brilliantly live.
I think I preferred this live gig of theirs to the one a year earlier by them at roadburn (which has been released on an LP +DVD) even though the vocals were extreme as hell back then

Yes. I'm content to use "atmospheric sludge" and "post-metal" interchangeably in most contexts. Some people say post-metal when they talk about metal influenced by post-rock (often it just boils down to reverb and delay) and post-hardcore (vocals?), other people refuse to use that term altogether. I know some communities and websites that never talk about post-metal, whereas MetalStorm does so frequently. I don't really care, so I'll use both!